Dungeon of the Endless is a Rogue-Like Dungeon-Defense game, in which the player and their team of heroes must protect the generator of their crashed ship while exploring an ever-expanding dungeon, all while facing waves of monsters and special events as they try to find their way out...

If you included a brief description and guidelines for our artist, we will only accept the ones in English

Keep your submissions in one post only (you can edit it until the deadline)

We will only accept original pieces of artwork: do not include references/art that you haven't produced

Use the art style and the technique of your choice and not necessarily pixel art

/!\ Take into account every element of the hero created by wkinchlea (link): race, gender, composition, weapon and personality

Rosetta uses a sword: we'll accept anything that resembles it, but we'll have to decline submissions that are too exotic for our taste!

ADVICE

The winner of part 1 is a lady robot: however, it doesn't need to have a human / lady human appearance

Use the existing elements of the game (creatures, environment, lore) to create a hero coherent with the game background

Surprise us!

DEADLINE

Submit your ideas before March 2nd. We’ll be closing the thread at midday (CET). We will choose the three best submissions that will move on to the G2G vote.

PRIZE

The two lucky winners (part 1 and part 2) will receive the following:

Your name in the game credits

A unique Dungeon of the Endless T-shirt

Three copies of Dungeon of the Endless (Crystal Pack), to play co-op with their friends!

Please note that Amplitude reserves the right to modify the 3 proposals and will work with the winners to finalise the design and adapt it to development constraints. Simon, our artist, will provide the final visual, based on the winning submission.

February 18

Last week, we opened a new forum contest and gave you the possibility to create the next hero in Dungeon of the Endless (thread). We received 120 submissions so thank you a lot for your participation. We gathered and debated and voted (nah, we didn't fight), and finally agreed on three hero ideas:

We'd like also to congratulate some forum users for their ideas. Our honourable mentions go to:

Akius Silver by Lynx_gnt

DR1LL4R by Think_Blindly

Knight Harmon by Rudest

Ex-General Veers by Codename_Veers

Utterson by melkathi

KL4-WN Bot by Tsrintox

The Jester by Shadomith

Snake-Eyes Cooper by Psyringe

Teddy Truman by Catgut

Here are also some data we were able to extract for this first part of the creation contest:

Reviews

“There’s nothing to rank alongside it. Influences and borrowings be damned – it stands alone and is as brilliantly designed, challenging and cunning a package of ideas and aesthetic choices as anything I’ve seen this year.”
Wot I Think – Rock, Paper, Shotgun

“Don’t be fooled by the simplicity of its pixels: no individual element of Dungeon of the Endless is especially complicated, but together they form a fiendish and unforgiving challenge. If you’re willing to take that on then it makes it more than worthwhile, borrowing from several genres to create something that feels unique - as well as bursting with personality and smart choices.”
8.1/10 – IGN

“From its setting to its design and aesthetic, Dungeon of the Endless feels like a game built for me. It’s tough and unforgiving, but it’s also fair. Despite all the deaths I spent climbing through the dungeon’s floors, I slowly mastered the game. That’s a testament to the roguelike genre, and it’s why I like tangling with it so much.”
4.5/5 – Game Revolution

About the Game Editions

Dungeon of the Endless Digital Game

Play Dungeon of the Endless on PC and Mac.

Official Digital Soundtrack

All Dungeon of the Endless tracks created by FlybyNo in mp3 format.

”Dungeon of the Endless” Amplitude Badge

Adds a unique badge to your Amplitude account.

Adds 200 G2G to the value of your votes on our website.

Dungeon of the Endless Digital Game

Play Dungeon of the Endless on PC and Mac.

Dungeon of the Endless "Bookworm" Add-on

Adds “The Library” spaceship that unlocks a new mode for the game.

Adds Josh ‘Ntello to the hero cast of the game.

Official Digital Soundtrack

All Dungeon of the Endless tracks created by FlybyNo in mp3 format.

”Dungeon of the Endless” Amplitude Badge

Adds a unique badge to your Amplitude account.

Adds 200 G2G to the value of your votes on our website.

Endless Legend "Mezari" Unit Skins

The “Mezari” look for your Vaulter units in Endless Legend.

About This Game

A few hundred condemned criminals were being shipped to the Auriga system on board the prison hulk “Success”. While this was presented as a chance to earn back their place in society by working hard for the common good, they understood that in fact they would be slave labour, sent to colonize an unexplored planet. All they knew about Auriga Prime was what the probes told them: it had water, temperate zones, plant life, and plenty of metals in the crust.

In fact, the planet Auriga once hosted a major settlement of the galaxy-travelling ancestors known as the Endless. In addition, the planet was still orbited by a functioning (and well cloaked) defensive system, which sprang eagerly to life upon the arrival of the Success. Within a few minutes, the ship was nothing but a few large chunks of metal falling toward the planet.

Every set of holding cells also functioned as an escape pod, so the ship let itself disintegrate and the surviving prisoners fell bruised but (temporarily) alive and (momentarily) safe to the planet below. Safe, that is, until they realized that they had crashed through some sort of facility of the Endless, down to a sub-basement so deep and ancient it might as well be called a dungeon…

Gather A Team.

Form a team of heroes, each with their own strengths (and psychoses)

Equip them, deploy them, and earn powerful abilities

Manage the balance between ex-prison inmates and guards

Experience four player coop and watch your back

Build Your Defenses.

Use the Dust you gather to power the rooms

Use scarce resources to help your team survive

Build minor and major modules to hold off waves of monsters

Decode Endless ruins to discover life-saving technologies

Open the Door.

Each door is a danger; prepare yourself and your team for anything

Explore and discover an infinity of levels and layouts

Carry your crystal through waves of monsters to the exit of each level

Dungeon of the Endless wears a leather jacket, has a greaser pompadour, and smokes cigarettes in the bathroom. Old Man Tower Defense catches him.

"You can't smoke in here," says Old Man Tower Defense. Dungeon of the Endless puts out his cigarette on the old man's face and steals his style.

"Get lost," says Dungeon of the Endless, and Old Man Tower Defense shuffles back to his room at the old genres' home.

4X Strategy Nerd is walking down the hall as Dungeon of the Endless walks out of the bathroom, smelling like bathroom soap and Camels. DotE shakes him down for his gameplay elements and stuffs him in a locker.

After school, DotE hangs out with his friend Ritchie "Rogue-Like" Valens.

"I wanna put a band together," says DotE.

"Yeah? Watcha thinkin?" says Ritchie.

"I got all these things I stole from people at school," says DotE.

Ritchie looks at these Tower Defense elements and these 4X strategy elements and wonders if it could work. He looks at DotE and sees that look in his face - if he could trick Principal RTS into eating fifteen cans of Spam to get people to believe in base-building and resource management again, he could do this.

"Yeah. Yeah," says Ritchie. "It'll take some thinking, but we could make this work."

Firstly, a TL;DR for the lazy reader:+ Great Art and Music+ Great lore, for those interested in the Endless setting+ Great design and interpretation of the rogue-like genre+ For 10 bucks, you can enjoy at least a solid 6-10 hours of gameplay and potentially dozens more.- The game’s mechanics may not be for you, read section “Game Mechanics” for more info.- Multiplayer is underdeveloped and riddled with problems

Read More:Dungeon of the Endless follows the lore of previous games by Amplitude Studios (Endless Space & Endless Legend) and presents it this time, in a “rogue-like” fashion. The objective is simple: Explore the dungeon, search the rooms and then get the dust crystal through swarms of aliens into the teleporter for the next floor. The mechanics of this game are somewhat profound and relatively unique, based on a turn-like system that dispenses new events after a door in the dungeon is opened. This isn’t to be mistaken with the fact that the game is very much in real-time, players will have to make very quick decisions on defensive relocations, retreats and emergency use of skills/medkits. I imagine the most convenient mechanics comparison to be drawn here is to that of Faster Than Light.

Game Mechanics:The biggest design component of the game leads me to warn potential buyers to possible disappointment- heed my word. Suppose the main feature of rogue-likes that people enjoy is the risk: reward decisions one has to make. This is tied with the subsequent “snowballing” of a character’s strengths and the increasing challenges; item collections in Risk of Rain, Binding of Isaac. At first glance, Dungeon of the Endless may not meet these expectations, decisions to develop one’s character is often met with only simply a new ability or meagre stat boosts. This isn’t an inherent flaw in the design but rather, a choice made to cater to players having to combine all of the resources: Industry, to build modules for resources and defense, food for character development and medkits, sciences for researching better modules. A player that may only enjoy, say, the character development of a roguelike will be met with disappointment here as one cannot neglect the other aspects of the game in order to succeed- the very same reason why Amplitude has curbed the potential of characters clearing whole floors by themselves.

However, when said mechanics are utilised properly the game truly shines. Players will find themselves scrutinising their floor’s layout, optimising where to allocate power and resources, what resources are most required, whether or not to save resources for the next floor, if characters should be replaced by newfound possible companions, the list goes on. Decision making is the core component of the game that gives it drive, anticipation of resources desperately needed, whether it be dust or a replacement for a fallen companion will lead players into a game that forces them to make decisions. Make no mistake, the game is balls to the walls difficult and will not hesitate to stomp on your carefully knitted floor plans whenever it gets the chance. For this, I commend the developers in creating a relatively fresh balance of mechanics in a recently inflated genre of “rogue-likes”.

Multiplayer:Multiplayer is also quite entertaining with gameplay identical to that of singleplayer except with one character per player. This leads to less micro-managing and a larger pool of resources, making the game easier only when players can cooperate properly and plan ahead together. The biggest complaint I have about this however, is the lack of a save-multiplayer feature, thus games can often stretch out for multiple hours and leave players exhausted or unwilling to continue. Furthermore, the lack of a host migration system means that if a host leaves the game—you’re screwed. Amplitude must address these features as they are critical to the quality of gameplay and I find myself only playing alone or with a friend instead of with other players.

Art & Music:Other than that, the only noteworthy mention of the game is its further development of the Endless lore, which I am a particular fan of and DotE does not fail to impress, new characters and revelations about the world left me relatively keen on the story of the game. Furthermore, secret character interactions are revealed when specific combinations of characters are placed in a party, leading to a more interesting play through and for the eager player, experimentation with compositions. This lore is accompanied by a pixel art style that is of an impressive quality and the usual stature of music that amplitude has impressed me with so far. Though these are subjective and you in particular may not agree with me.

Final Judgement:For the singleplayer experience alone, I recommend the game for its listed retail price. On sale, it’s a must-buy. Though multiplayer bogs the game’s overall quality down, Amplitude is known to respond very well to player criticisms and I am confident they will address these issues. Overall a fantastic little game. On my first playthrough, I fought hard to get the crystal to the elevator and in my rash attempt to escape, left my other party members behind to get eaten by aliens. Made me think “Would play again”- and I did, a lot.

Before playing Dungeon of the Endless, I've played a HUGE host of roguelikes from Angband to Tales of Maj'Eyal to Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead. If anything, these roguelikes have one thing in common - as you get more and more powerful, the game tries to match you with tougher challenges, even up to the point where the game simply is unfair. This is not necessarily a bad thing - it gives a sense of challenge and adventure with every playthrough.

Dungeon of the Endless, however, breaks from that mold. The concepts and challenges are simple: find the exit, bring the Crystal to the exit, defend the crystal carrier against waves of enemies. Compared to most roguelike, Dungeon of the Endless is relatively gimmick-free: there is one non-random gimmick about characters killing one another due to their relationship, which is incredibly frustrating but is easily avoided in your next playthrough (unlike unbeatable scenarios in FTL or some "trap" areas in Tales of Maj'Eyal). If you lose, it's not the fault of the game as it usually is in roguelikes - it's all yours. Maybe you didn't think about watching your carrier's back; maybe you neglected defending a certain chokepoint, leading to your party getting flanked and killed.

Since you know it's your mistake, you can determine what you did wrong and how you can prevent it next time. Not only is it a new game every single time, but you learn and refine your strategy, and you buckle down and see if you can make it to a deeper floor with your experience this time.

Dungeon of the Endless represents what a modern roguelike should aspire to be: a highly replayable game that provides a genuine, fair challenge that you can climb through and improve your skill in every playthrough.

Start the game DieStart the game again1st floor complete, 2nd floor completeDieStart againLevel up heroes DieLook at strategy guids for helpDieFinally get to the last floor and thenDieAmazing game it doesnt get boring 10/10

I had a review for this before. But that was when it was in early access.

Now this is a review for the game now it has been released.

You should be buying this already. Hell, you should have already bought it.

Here's the deal. Do you like tower defence? Do you like roguelikes? Do you like dungeon crawling strategy type games? If the answer to all three is yes, then I can imagine your trepidation at hearing that this game combines all three, as I was nervous too. I mean there IS such a thing as too much of a good thing, and too many cooks spoil the broth, and sometimes many great things added together do not make an awesome thing...

But in this case you can lay your fears to rest. Dungeon of the Endless is an incredible game, so much fun, brutally difficult and very rewarding. It requires quick thinking, strategic planning, and a buttload of blind stupid balls-to-the-walls courage at times.

The BAD parts of this game is that the view is very zoomed in, and there are only two states to the view. Zoomed right the hell in, or zoomed right the hell out so it looks like a map screen. This DOES make things slightly awkward, especially if you have split your party to explore a particularly large dungeon, or if an attack comes from various areas of the map.

Secondly it's unforgivingly hard, even on "Too Easy" mode. The game lies. Too Easy is still brutally hard. You will lose party members. You will get two floors with a new team member unscathed, only to have them die suddenly and unexpectedly during the rush to get the crystal to the next floor before you can unlock him or her fully.

Thirdly the pixelly graphics may not appeal to some. To me, personally, they are amazing, I love them. They've got a lot of charm, BUT I recognise that it isn't always everyone's thing. It CAN also make combat extremely confusing. Granted you don't have to directly target any enemies, but it's still difficult to watch lots of things at once.

Finally the control system takes a little getting used to. It's simple enough to navitage everything via right clicks and left clicks and such but getting used to the UI and how it does equipping and everything is .... well it feels slightly counter-intuitive. An ability to click-drag items about would have been nice for example, and a quicker way to open/close inventory/stat panels too...

Now for the good stuff:

Music? Really nice. Not too epic, sadly, but not annoying at all, or obnoxiously loud and grating, nor does it overwhelm you. The devs know when to use what music and it's very apparent that in that aspect their sound design is definately on the ball.

Gameplay mechanics? rock solid. Resource management and building, turret defence/augmentation placement, power management and placement, the Risk/reward nature of opening just one door or many doors for the added XP/loot multiplier at the risk of being overrun by swarms of enemies, the various different types of enemies and their priority targets, the sheer volume of characters and skills and strengths... The pure joy of opening a door and finding a merchant or item box and being able to equip something awesome is amazing. Finding cool little things like Steles or Research Artefacts is also great fun.

Also this game has an amazing, rather dark sense of humour. Characters make quips as they traverse between levels and as they open certain doors, they talk to each other, they crack jokes... The item/skill/module descriptions as well are ALWAYS worth reading too for a good chuckle.

As for a game that's come through Early Access? Incredible results. It's come out so polished and refined, and so full of meat and bones that it's become an even greater game for all the feedback the fans gave it. This is well worth your money and absolutely a lot of fun.

So many puppets, so many strings... And once we've lifted off, who cares if they figure out who was pulling them? No one on the ship will return to Mazen. Our future lies among the stars.

The Dungeon of the Endless

Dungeon of the Endless is a hard and unforgiving game. It teaches its gameplay mechanics by making you die a thousand times over. With each run you'll find yourself in a different situation, can't find the elevator exit, not enough dust to power another set of rooms, not enough industry to create much needed modules etc. It's an addictive game. Each playthrough has twelve floors, which get much and much harder with every floor.

So many puppets

A few hundred condemned criminals find themselves shipped on the prison ship "Success". Only for the ship to be shot by a nearby planets defensive system. A few escape pods flew off towards the planet, and crash deep inside an old facility of the Endless. The game has an roster of nineteen heroes, which are all very unique and fun to control. You start with two heroes and you can recruit two other random heroes you find deep inside the dungeon. With the big roster of heroes, you'll easily find a favorite. Each hero is balanced by his/her/its strength, defense, speed and DPS. The heroes are all set in three different factions: Prisoner, Crew or Native. This will also affect your group, heroes can have special conversations in the elevator rides in between the floors and they can have special buffs if heroes from the same factions are present in the room with each other.

So many strings

Dungeon of the Endless has rouge-lite elements like FTL and The Binding of Isaac, RPG elements with its leveling and skill system, and tower defence elements with the modules that you need to protect yourself with. It's a weird combination of genres, but it works so amazingly fine. As said before, it's an addictive game, you'll die many times because of its hard and unforgiving nature. But sometimes it feels unfair and based around luck. You could've made this floor easily if only you choose the upper path instead of the path to the left. This is what I think every time I die, but that gives it just a little bit more of that addictiveness.

Conclusion

Dungeon of the Endless is a true gem. A game that you see or hear little to nothing about on steam, but deserves so much more attention than that it gets. With a giant roster of great heroes, and a perfect mix of genres that you would've never suspected to even get mixed. The game can sometimes be based around luck a lot, making runs very unfair at times. That being said, Dungeon of the Endless is definitely worth your money. That is if you're up for a big challenge.

Great combination of rogue-like and tower defense gameplay creating something very original along with a great art style. I would say that the game is amazing with one big caveat -- it's not balanced at the moment. The game's primary resource: Dust controls how many rooms you can have lit up or safe from enemy spawns. However getting the resource is entirely too random and it's the main game ender at the moment.

Not having enough dust will leave you with multiple rooms that will spawn enemies and there is no way for you to cope even with the best defenses or heroes in the game. Until the developers do something to fix the balance, Dungeon of the Endless is a great but frustrating game that has limited replayability because of it.

Dungeon of the Endless is unlike any other game. It is a top-down real-time tactical squad-based tower defense RPG roguelike, which does not make any sense as a concept. It is also, somehow, very fun and vey hard and gives all the feelings of reward and tension and loss that a well-designed roguelike game should. On top of that, Amplitude puts an exceptional level of polish and awesome UI design into this and all their other games, more so than almost any AAA or indie titles I've ever seen.

The game plays a lot like FTL on a dungeon layout rather than inside a ship - you command your units to a certain room or door and they'll set about doing whatever task they can, but it's also topped with an equipment, level-up, and skills system that gives layer of individual investment in your heroes similar to 2000-era Infinity Engine RPGs. Within every floor of the dungeon, you're also gathering and investing resources into a sort of base-building system, using build-nodes and a power grid to either auto-generate more resources or to actively help your heroes in defending rooms. It all takes a lot of getting used to, but once you get enough of a grasp on all the systems to work towards understanding them better, they come together in a really satisfying way.

The soundtrack is very FTL as well (perhaps too FTL-like, even), noticeable but not overbearing space-y background tracks that feel fitting for whatever situation you're in. There's a large amount of flavor text across equipment, research, hero dialog, and other things like that, and everything I've seen of it has been generally informative and often surprisingly funny. The humor isn't the overt RPG-parody style of something like Dungeons of Dredmor, but more simple and under-stated in a way that's appropriate to the style and setting.

The one complaint I have so far is that there seems to be no way to move multiple heroes as a unit, at least not that I've found. I very often want 2 or more heroes to stay together or all get into one room ASAP, but my instinct to use click-and-drag style group selection does not work. It's kind of flow-breaking to instead select people one by one and then issue each of them the exact same movement command, and it makes breaching new rooms as a group or falling back to a different position more cumbersome and take a bit longer than it should. A very minor interface gripe in an experience that has otherwise been awesome. (**EDIT: Nevermind most of this paragraph - there is a way to set groups and quick-select those groups. But I still think click-and-drag selection would be the ideal.**)

Bottom-line short-form summary: This game is fun, and I have never played anything like it and maybe never will again. I'm not capable of recommending anything more highly than that.

Dungeon of the Endless (DoTE) is a strange mix of genres that works surpisingly well. Part tower defence, part squad management and part roguelike.

DoTE presents an interesting dilemma for the player; should I open this door? Ever door you open has the chance to make your escape to the next floor harder. Every room you don't run power too, and very rarely will you have enough power for every room, has a chance to spawn hordes of aleins who want you dead. You can slow their assault by building towers in powered rooms. You must also choose which resources to generate so you can afford more towers, tower upgrades or character levels. Everything in DoTE comes down to a simple choice: how hard do I want to make this for myself? All of this, with a helping of humour and increasing difficulty results in very rewarding risk/reward gameplay.

There is a wealth of characters in DoTE, all with their own strengths and weaknesses. Their combined flavour texts makes for an interesting narrative and the various interactions between the characters in the post level screen is a very nice touch and makes the world feel alive. You will rectuit additional squad members the deeping you dive into the dungeon, but you will have to decide who to sacrafice in order to create room for them as you can onyl have 4 squad members. Even unlocking new characters for future playthroughs has a risk/reward aspect to it as you must dive at least 3 floors into the dungeon with your new compainion before they are available to you for other playthroughs.

The only downsides to DoTE are in the multiplayer. At the time of writing this here are my issues:

You cannot create private multiplayer matches. This has resulted in me kicking many people (sorry!) when I only wanted to play with a friend.

You cannot trade items between player's characters outside of selling the items to the shop keeper and having them buy them.

The game tends to drop connections often and you cannot rejoin a game which effectively ends it.

You cannot save your progress in a multiplayer game and a game of DoTE can take a few hours so make sure you have nothing else you need to do before you start a game up.

I hope that the devs iron out the technical issues so that multiplayer can be a more enjoyable experience.

In conclusion, I would highly reccomend this game despite its flaws in multiplayer. If you like rogue-likes and tower defence games you should definitely try this one out. It is a steal at only $14 (CAD) and some of the most fun I have had with a game in recent memory!

THIS GAME IS AMAZING! I went for 10 hours straight when i got it and still want more. I Got the founders pack because its actually fricken awesome. This game has so much replay value, Its very well thought out and gets pretty tough. The rpg element is just as awesome as the tower defence, it blends together perfectly. I wasnt even a fan of tower defence games that much but this game is just great. Once you start getting some items and a party of 4 it gets really fun. It has really cool music in it as well! 10/10 from me. Im also trying to think of bad things about it but I just cant! :D

Great game.Marathoned the first difficulty with a friend and had a blast.

-Well thought mechanics, punishing but very rewarding, and the RNG is well adjusted (for the difficulty level I tried at least).-Beautiful art, I often stop to look at the rooms and imagine what could have happened there.-Higher difficulty levels are not just tougher monsters, but variations in the game mechanics that force you to think differently.

If you don't feel like reading the entire things here's the summary:As with any game, keep in mind that this may not be the right combination of elements for you. I'd say if you enjoy tower defense games, roguelike mechanics, science fiction settings, and a subtle sense of humour, there is a high probability that you will enjoy this one. If you get easily frustrated or like strategy based only on skill, without an element of luck, perhaps this is not the game for you.

Personally, I love this game. It has all the right ingredients for me, and it's quickly become a favourite. I can't praise it enough.

Good points:

+Solid design and game mechanics.+Beautiful pixel art.+Immersive soundtrack and sound effects.+Great characters and subtle humour.+Endless replayability. Every game is different, and every combination of heroes and items will make you rethink your approach.+Good time versatility: you can either pick it up for half an hour or half a day. Though a complete run will require several hours to complete, once you know the game mechanics it's relatively easy to pick up a game partway through.+Relatively frequent updates. In a time where far too many games get abandoned in Early Access stage, finding developers that actually listen to the players and release updates seems such a rarity!

Possible caveats:

-I have not tested the multiplayer

(The general consensus seems to be that it still needs some work. Same with some crashing issues. The developers seem to be aware and working on it.)

-Difficulty spike towards the later levels. Even the easiest settings can be very, very challenging. This may make the game feel unbalanced.-On that same note, bear in mind that you require both skill and luck to win the game.

These points are not a problem for me, I've played old school roguelikes and this one feels pretty forgiving in comparison, but it may not be everyone's cup of tea. A bad combination of items, heroes or rooms, and your late game may become nearly impossible. A good one, and you can win with much less effort (though a certaion degree of skill is a must, and you will still be punished quite severely for acting foolishly or carelessly).

I do like that element of luck, and find that any frustration vanishes fairly quickly in the face of the next challenge (a rarity for me these days, as I don't have much free time and seem to have grown old and grumpy when it comes to frustrating games). I find luck a perk, rather, something that distinguishes this game from other roguelikes, and I think the immersion really helps, in my case.

-Some extra content is unlocked separately

I'm making a note of this because I've seen some nasty comments around. There is a special edition of the game (crystal pack) that unlocks an extra character and ship, but if you want the other extra character and ship you have to buy the special edition of Endless Legend, as well. I believe that the developers plan to later unlock this content, but are giving this option now for early supporters of their games, which I think is a fair strategy. I think this is much preferable to standard DLC, in any case. Your opinion may differ, so I think it is fair to give a warning.

This is how Early Access should work. Now I only bought this game two weeks before release, but at that point it was already more polished and complete than most on release and now that is is officially out I am blown away by the quality!

I just love this game for the randomness, but usually that isn't enough for me what makes this game special is every game feels like a new story. "Does this group have what it takes?" I find myself asking, "Is luck on my side today?" sometimes I find my way through the maze and beeline to the exit, (happened on floor 10 kinda scared me because its so damn huge and I found the exit so fast couldn't even power half the rooms on the way to the exit) and the writing for the characters is awesome! Sure they don't talk much but the descriptions, plus the few intertwining stories that you may or may not hear in the elevator really flesh out the characters to a point where I find myself making up relationships between them that might fit, or thinking about how much they must hate having to work together and I will even make up friendships between heroes that end up working together throught multiple floors. (sometimes i can even encorperate one of the "canon" stories into it and it just feels great) On top of all that. is an amazing game that doesn't really have any peers (at least to my knowledge) sure it feels like FTL or Space Marines or what have you but it combines them all in such a way that it creates something revolutionary. I see this as almost a difficult story generating game, where the goal isn't to win but to create a good story.

Dungeon of the Endless was a game that I was avoiding. Tower Defense wasn't my "scene" and the pixelated (albeit stylized) graphics didn't grab me either. However, many of my gaming friends at "Octopus Overlords" were raving about it, so I eventually gave it a try. And I'm glad I did.

In the game, your crew of heroes must explore a floor of a spaceship to find the exit. Then, they must transport the generator/crystal to the exit to progress to the next floor, and ultimately exit and win the game. What really hooked me were the RPG elements built in to the game, where you can upgrade and customize your crew members, also outfitting them with weapons and gear. The random nature of each floor and the included encounters/events/surprises appealed to me too (but then, I'm a sucker for Rogue-like games). Lastly, as a gamer with a family, it's nice that each floor makes a satisfying, quick play session - convenient for when real life calls. (There is a "Save & Quit" option if needed mid-level). And I haven't even gotten to the point where I've unlocked all of the ships and crewmembers to use.

Drawbacks: The tutorial is short and not entirely helpful. I had to check the wiki for clarity on some of the game basics. (i.e. - Opening doors are the "turn" mechanism; You manually choose to level characters from their inventory/stat screens;etc.). I haven't attempted multi-player, though it seems people are reporting problems at this date. (The developers are continuing to address this with patches.) I've not encountered any technical problems, on my mid-level gaming laptop.

Overall, I highly recommend this game. It's surprised me with how much fun it has been, once I got the hang of it. To win me over to a genre that I usually avoid is high praise, in my opinion. My last thought (again, shared by an Octopus Overlord member): "Easy" level is hard. "Very easy" is normal. Don't be afraid to start there.

This game is great fun, but hosting multiplayer is hell, if you're buying this game to play with friends make sure your connection is the most stable thing ever. Small connection interuptions as well as steam matinence will end the game and theres no way to reconnect with your pals on the same level without them restarting, which with 2 hour + long games can be very frustrating. I hope the multiplayer gets polished because its the only thing tarnishing this otherwise amazing game

(Note - I have a lot more hours than shown as I have played a LOT of this game in offline mode)

This game is really fun. The art is great, the music is IMHO very good, and fits great. The mechanics are solid and fun to play with. Progress feels like it moves at a good pace, and there is a nice dual-progress system in that you have your in-game progress of leveling up heroes and building the team up, getting new tech, stockpiling resources and getting items for your heroes, and then you have your between-game progress with starting hero and pod unlocks.

Overall I'd strongly reccomend. Its a great game that makes you think a bit (but not too hard!), punishes you fairly for bad decisions and helps you learn your way, but it isn't brutal on you (especially with the ability to pause at will with the spacebar). Its quite a departure from other Amplitude games (i.e. its not a 4X) but they've done this really well and I would 100% reccomed this game